NSA leaker Edward Snowden – National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden poses with German Green party parliamentarian Hans-Christian Stroebele in Moscow on October 31. Stroebele returned from the meeting with a letter from Snowden to German authorities, which was distributed to the media. In it, Snowden said he is confident that with international support, the United States would abandon its efforts to "treat dissent as defection" and "criminalize political speech with felony charges."

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Snowden's refugee document granted by Russia is seen during a news conference in Moscow on August 1. Snowden slipped quietly out of the airport after securing temporary asylum in Russia, ending more than a month in limbo.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Sen. Charles Schumer, D-New York, leaves a last-minute news conference at the U.S. Capitol after Russia announced that it would grant Snowden temporary asylum on August 1. "Russia has stabbed us in the back, and each day that Mr. Snowden is allowed to roam free is another twist of the knife," he said.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Snowden's father, Lon Snowden, who has adamantly supported his son, talks to reporters in Washington on Tuesday, July 30. He has urged his son to remain in Russia "until we have assurances that he would receive a fair trial."

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Demonstrators in Berlin hold a protest march on Saturday, July 27, in support of Snowden and WikiLeaks document provider Bradley Manning. Both men have been portrayed as traitors and whistle-blowers. Manning was acquitted on July 30 on the most serious charge of aiding the enemy, but he was convicted on several other counts and likely faces a lengthy term in a military prison.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena, center, speaks with journalists at the Sheremetyevo International Airport in Moscow after meeting with Snowden on Wednesday, July 24. Kucherena said he was in daily contact with Russian authorities about securing permission for Snowden to leave the airport.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Snowden meets with human rights activists and lawyers on July 12 in a transit zone of the Russian airport. It was his first public appearance since he left Hong Kong on June 23. He announced that he was seeking refuge Russia while awaiting safe passage to Latin America, where he has been offered asylum.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting in Prokhorovka on July 12. Russian officials said Snowden abandoned his effort to seek asylum in the country after Putin warned that he would have to stop leaking information about U.S. surveillance programs if he wanted to stay.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – A woman burns American flags during a protest in support of Bolivian President Evo Morales in front of the U.S. embassy in Mexico City on July 4. Leftist Latin American leaders and activists were fuming after some European nations temporarily refused Morales' plane access to their airspace amid suspicions Snowden was aboard.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Bolivian President Evo Morales holds a news conference at the Vienna International Airport on July 3. He angrily denied any wrongdoing after his plane was diverted to Vienna and said that Bolivia is willing to give asylum to Snowden, as "fair protest" after four European countries restricted his plane from flying back from Moscow to La Paz.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Umbrellas with slogans are lined up before a protest march to the U.S. consulate in Hong Kong on June 15. Snowden was hiding in Hong Kong, where he arrived on May 20 before blowing the lid off the NSA surveillance operation.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Protesters in Hong Kong shout slogans in support of Snowden on June 13. The NSA leaker vowed to fight any bid to extradite him from Hong Kong.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Graffiti sympathetic to Snowden is stenciled on the sidewalk in San Francisco on June 11.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – An American flag flutters in front of the U.S. consulate in Hong Kong on June 10.

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NSA leaker Edward Snowden – Snowden outs himself on June 9 in the British newspaper The Guardian, which published details of his revelations about the NSA electronic surveillance programs. "I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong," he said in a video interview.

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Story highlights

Now in Russia, Snowden is charged in the United States with espionage

He says U.S. must change whistle-blower protections before he comes back

He says U.S. "can correct the laws, restrain the overreach of agencies"

Edward Snowden douses the idea of his returning to the United States -- where he faces charges of espionage and theft of government property for leaking sensational details of spy programs -- saying he won't come back unless laws are changed.

Asked by CNN's Jake Tapper in an online chat Thursday about conditions for a return home, Snowden said that while his coming back "is the best resolution" for all parties, "it's unfortunately not possible in the face of current whistle-blower protection laws."

He pointed out that the government's Whistleblower Protection Act doesn't cover someone like him, a former government contractor.

"There are so many holes in the laws, the protections they afford are so weak, and the processes for reporting they provide are so ineffective that they appear to be intended to discourage reporting of even the clearest wrongdoing," he wrote. "... My case clearly demonstrates the need for comprehensive whistle-blower protection act reform."

Snowden offered his remarks from Russia, where he's been since June having been granted a one-year asylum.

From there, he has continued to speak out to journalists and online. Thursday's chat -- coordinated by The Courage Foundation, an organization set up to support Snowden and his cause -- was one example of his outreach, letting him answer questions from anyone who posed a question online.

The U.S. government hasn't stayed silent on his case either. On Thursday, around the time that Snowden was answering questions online, Attorney General Eric Holder said that "if Mr. Snowden wanted to come back to the United States and enter a plea, we would engage with his lawyers."

The government would take the same tack with anyone willing to plead guilty., Holder said at the event at the University of Virginia's Miller Center.

But in Snowden's case, the attorney general insisted, "Clemency isn't something that we (are) willing to consider."

Such a standoff is nothing new, as the U.S. government and Snowden have been at odds since the Guardian and Washington Post newspapers first published stories last June based on secret documents he'd provided them.

These and subsequent reports transformed the once relatively anonymous 30-year-old into a lightning rod for critics who called him a traitor and a hero for those who cheered his exposing what they see as dangerous infringements on civil liberties.

Whatever one's opinion of him, the leaks undoubtedly brought intense scrutiny to the National Security Agency's surveillance programs, causing headaches for the U.S. government, domestically and internationally.

This uproar spurred President Barack Obama this month to unveil new guidance for intelligence gathering as well as reforms intended to balance what he called the nation's vital security needs with concerns over privacy and liberties.

Nonetheless, some civil libertarians, members of Congress and others complained that Obama didn't go far enough.

Among other things, they point to the fact that someone will still collect records of the numbers and times of phone calls by every American -- one of the most controversial programs revealed by Snowden -- even if access to the those records will be tightened and they may be shifted from the NSA to elsewhere.

Snowden echoed such critics when asked about Obama's speech in relation to Thursday's release of a privacy review board's report critical of the government. The five-member Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board concluded the NSA's collection of data on nearly every U.S. phone call isn't legal and has proven largely useless in thwarting terrorism.

"When even the federal government says the NSA violated the constitution at least 120 million times under a single program, but failed to discover even a single plot, it's time to end bulk collection, which is a euphemism for mass surveillance," Snowden wrote, pointing to the review's report. "There is simply no justification for continuing an unconstitutional policy with a 0% success rate."

In Thursday's chat, Snowden insisted "not all spying is bad." He said his issue is more with "the new technique of indiscriminate mass surveillance, where governments are seizing billions and billions and billions of innocents' communication every single day."

Such programs exist in part "because new technologies make it easy and cheap," not because they are particularly effective in targeting threats and wrongdoers, he claimed. Snowden said he acted because he felt compelled "to push back."

"It's not good for our country, it's not good for the world, and I wasn't going to stand by and watch it happen, no matter how much it cost me," he wrote.

"The NSA and the rest of the US Intelligence Community is exceptionally well positioned to meet our intelligence requirements through targeted surveillance -- the same way we've always done it -- without resorting to the mass surveillance of entire populations."

His decision to collect and release secret documents have helped make Snowden one of America's most high-profile critics since Wikileaks' Julian Assange. who notably has been one of Snowden's biggest supporters.

Yet Snowden said Thursday that he hasn't given up hope for his native land, saying "what makes our country strong is our system of values."

"We can correct the laws, restrain the overreach of agencies, and hold the senior officials responsible for abusive programs to account," he said.

Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden both held jobs that gave them access to some of their country's most secret and sensitive intelligence. They chose to share that material with the world and are now paying for it.